It appears that Larry Sonsini, chairman and name partner of the high-powered Wilson Sonsini law firm, is a very good golfer. Earlier this year, while playing golf to celebrate his 70th birthday, the legendary lawyer scored a hole in one.

Sonsini isn’t the only one who’s scoring over at 650 Page Mill Road. His partners are doing deals left and right, and the fees are trickling down to the associates, who just scored some nice pay raises.

What is Wilson Sonsini up to? Let’s find out….

As you may recall, during the dark days of the Great Recession, Wilson Sonsini froze associate salaries. The freeze was announced at around the same time as significant layoffs, so WSGR lawyers who survived the layoffs could hardly complain.

Today, however, Wilson Sonsini resurrected the pre-freeze salary scale. If Jesus can rise from the dead, so can associate salaries. Happy Easter!

(FYI: I’m Catholic. And I love Jesus. So please don’t get on my case about the foregoing paragraph.)

The details about the Wilson Sonsini pay raise appear in the memo below. Said a tipster:

At last, market salaries [return] to Silicon Valley. Think this is in response to the Cooley raises. But as discussed before, Gunderson raised a while back. Not retroactive, so it kinda sucks.

UPDATE (5/3/11): Actually, at the time of this post, Gunderson had not yet announced a pay raise, and Cooley had announced a raise that had not yet taken effect. But now they have.

Complaining about non-retroactivity sounded a bit like looking a gift horse in the mouth, but a second source at WSGR echoed it:

The firm is doing so many deals lately, the corporate monster is rebounding with a vengeance, and taking its toll on corporate associates. Three cheers for Jack Sheridan and Keith Eggleton for raising salaries.

Now if only they could restore the [tens of thousands I’ve] lost by the freeze over the past [few] years….

So Wilson Sonsini is back on the standard $160K pay scale (at least in New York, Palo Alto, San Diego, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C.). What about spring bonuses?

One tipster isn’t expecting them:

I suspect that this true-up is a way of rewarding folks (in the wake of all the spring bonuses) without the one-time huge lump sum. The general tenor is that folks, given the option of either/or, much preferred the true up — because it keeps paying off each year.

Very doubtful that spring bonuses will follow.

As we previously said to class of 2010 associates who expressed unhappiness with their spring bonuses (or lack thereof), you really should look on the bright side of things. Wilson Sonsini is back on the NYC base salary scale. Isn’t that enough to celebrate?

After a review of the market for base salaries in each of our office locations, the firm has decided on the following actions, which will take effect on May 1, 2011:

The firm will make market-based salary adjustments as noted below for regular, U.S. associates in New York, Palo Alto, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, and Washington, D.C.

The adjustments will apply to associates in compensation years 2002-2009 in all of these offices, and also to associates in compensation year 2010 in Seattle. Salaries for associates in Austin will not change.

The salary adjustments will not apply to those attorneys in compensation year 2001 and earlier, as they already are at the top of our associate pay scale.

The revised salary grids in effect for regular associates in our U.S. offices are as follows:

We’ve all heard how dysfunctional entry-level legal recruiting is: Inordinate expense, decisions made on the briefest of subjective impressions with opacity all around, and what do firms reap for all their efforts? Shocking attrition rates among junior associates. It’s time for a conference on what could work better, and this is it.

When was the last time you took a second look at your student loans? If you’re like most borrowers, you probably try hard not to think about them. After all, dwelling on your debt isn’t going to make it go away any faster. Or is it?

Are you a junior to mid-level corporate/finance associate who has been contemplating a move to (or within) Washington, DC? In response to increased deal activity requiring “NY (or like-kind) trained” corporate associates, the Washington, DC corporate/finance market is experiencing an unusually high demand for your skills. Read more, and check out www.g-s.com.

Kinney is currently running an exclusive search for an Asia GC role at a well known tech start-up company, based in Shenzhen. This company has received significant recent praise for their new smart phone device in leading medial outlets, such as the New York Times, TIME, Mashable, Wired, Yahoo, and Forbes, among others.